Mercedes Half

At work we teach the SMART goal system, which means you want your goals to be Specific, Measurable, Action-oriented, Realistic, and Time-oriented. I'm big on the R. So when I don't meet my goals, and they were set very realistically, it was a bad day. BUT I did meet the goal for the half marathon this weekend! Only by a little. I wanted to break 1:35, since that was my PW set last year, and I ran a 1:34:20. I guess that's success, although it was hard to be overly excited about it. In three weeks is the Little Rock half, which I swear is less hilly than Birmingham, Damie! :)

On to the race details. It started at 7:03 am, according to the race info packet, which I guess is so that you notice the time, kind of like those speed limits that are 17 mph. We definitely beat the heat starting that early; i think it may have hit 40F by the finish line. Jeremy and I were staying at Megan and Austin's house, about 25 miles away, so it was an early start to the day. We'd already planned our parking strategy, which had us completely outside of the race course so that we could get out of there and out of the full marathoners' way after we finished. By the time we got parked, I was desperate for a bathroom and found a lone porta potty on a nearby street. It was padlocked. We walked quickly (as running would not help things) toward the start and suddenly came upon a posh hotel whose lobby was filled with runners. Bingo! Nice clean, flushable toilet, running water, and heat! 

The usual pre-race slow jog, finding of the bag check, corralling into the starting line, etc. went smoothly. We lined up about 20 yards back from the starting line, and noticed we were also about 20 yards in front of the 4:00 pacer, with no other pacers in sight. Where are all these 4000 people? It turned out there was no order to the line up whatsoever. I passed people in the first half mile at speeds just above a walk, and others flew by me 10 miles in, going at least 30 sec/mile faster than I was.

At approximately 7:03 -- actually I'm pretty sure it was before 7, but I'd forgotten my watch and was using J's old slow watch -- the starting gun was fired GOGOGO was yelled. I aimed for a 7:15 pace and hit what I believed to be the 1 mile mark (based on the Garmin beeps all around me) at 7:20. There was some maneuvering through the crowd, so I was happy. Mile 2 came at 14:25, so I was averaging close to perfect. Then came the third mile mark. I saw the clock turn over to 20:00 as the man next to me said, that sure was a fast mile. Yeah, a 5:35? Pretty sure I wasn't running that fast. But when I hit the next mile markers right on pace, I was hoping for a short course. :) Up and down and over hills, through downtown and neighborhoods we ran. I chatted with a few runners to pass the time and help me ignore some hip pain. OH the chronic hip pain. 

The longest road of the race was where the final mile was run. It was neverending. I considered trying to pick up the pace; my legs considered the opposite. We met in the middle and stayed consistent. I was passed for 13th place in the finishing chute, which bothered me none. She can have that unlucky number (just kidding, I'm not superstitious, but I really didn't see her coming). Plus she wasn't in my age group. 

I waited at the finish line for J, and just as I'd predicted, he finished just over 1:41. He was hoping for sub-1:45, and got an 11 min PR in this, his second ever half marathon. I'm hoping to set an 11 min PR in my next race. He mentioned that his legs cramped in the last mile, causing him to run that 1.1 in about 11 minutes. Now this just didn't seem right to me. Upon calculation I realized that my 1.1 had been 9 minutes long. Aha! The missing 90+ seconds were added back. I want to thank the course markers for putting the extra distance in the LAST mile, since that one isn't hard enough anyway.  

I've decided that if I'm good at anything, it's predicting my race outcome. So for Little Rock I'm predicting that I'll take 2 minutes off this time and run a 1:32. Determination has to be a factor in this whole running thing, and I'm starting to train it today. 

Little by little does the trick.  - Aesop